I Want To Go Back...

I was bored. And I was running out of things to do.

All the books I owned had been read, and the 192 GB of movies in my computer had been watched. The PlayStation soon lost its charm after the umpteenth playthrough, and the lack of good programs soon made the TV and I part ways too.

I was so very bored.

This sucker kept me engrossed for about two hours.

And it was in this state that I found an ancient relic that was stashed away in a corner of my study table: the diary I wrote in when I was in the sixth grade.

Now normally, if I had found my old diary somewhere, I would have just trashed it. I mean, I did put it to rest for a reason right? Perhaps it got too monotonous, or I grew out of the habit, I would have thought.

But at that point, I was bored enough to regard bungee jumping of the terrace without a bungee cord attached, so I decided to give reading my diary all over again a whirl.

And boy, did I love myself for making that decision later.

I opened the first page, and this is the entry I found:

Monday, January 19^th 2009,

5:00 PM

Dear Diary,

Today must be the worst day of my life! I was informed (by an irate doctor) that I have a bad case of sinusitis, and so have to follow a few things, so that my head doesn’t blow up I get better soon:

1) No TV.

2) No Nintendo

3) No computer.

4) No running.

5) No jumpy things.

6) I also hafta get a shot today tommorow and the day after!

Uppa’s gonna Dubai today, so Kadar Uncle hasta take me.

CAN IT GET ANY WORSE??? L

                                           ME L

PS: don’t trust Kikka! He is a dufus!

And the rest of the entries just had me cracking up with laughter. The sheer boredom of mine that drove me to put down my pen on paper and write, had produced some really original results, most of which had me in splits all over again.

Case in point: one very fine day, in the middle of Hajj Holidays, 2010, I, my nephew and niece, and my brother were so bored, that we made up an organization called “Anti Adult Association’ (or the A.A.A.) and put down all our secret plans on paper in my diary:

Oath

I, member of the A.A.A., swear to remain devoted and loyal to the association, and swear never to betray our valuable secrets to those we oppose.

I swear to abide by this law as long as I live, or am dragged over to their side.

I remain,

Loyal and devoted.

Signatories:

(Sanaa)                       (Fadhil)              (ZAIN)                  (Fahid)

This gaunt and morose page was followed by this one:

A.A.A.

Adult Disease Directory

SUBJECT: Adult diseases involving kids (in alphabetic order):

NAME OF DISEASE	EFFECT
Adultophy (also known as Responsibitis, in some parts of Asia)	Excessive urging by parents to grow up and shoulder more responsibilities.
Babiphily	Treats children (often smallest ones) like babies. Commonly found in more elder species of parents.
Groundasia	Excessive grounding.
Hygienophily	Commands children to clean their rooms almost all the time
Kidolophia	Causes extreme unconfidence in children.
Overstuffonomy	Makes children eat more, especially commenting that they’ve gotten “thin”.
Say-hellotomy	Forces children to interact with guests.
Spyandtelly  (XD)	Spies on children to leak international secrets; very rarely found.

(Note: Most of the above would be called “good parenting” now, I think. Except for that last one of course. ;)   )

But with each page, I began to see more of the persona that I used to have: soon, the carefree boy, who thought of every new obstacle as a challenge, the timid bully magnet, who was too scared to try and sort things out, and the aspiring writer, who tried his hand at writing stuff which no one would see, became a familiar memory to me, along with many others.

Soon, I had finished reading the whole diary. Everything in it passed through my mind unfiltered, except for one lingering thought: given the chance to rewind time, I would definitely do so. But not to change the things I did: no, I’d live my glorious life precisely the way that I had, in the precise same order.

I want to find myself back in the old times, when I didn’t have to worry about anything, when simple rules defined the way my life went.

I want to travel back in time, to a period where backstabbing friends, and treacherous enemies were of lesser concern than a broken toy of mine.

I want to go back.